Friday, 5 June 2009

Speaking Cycle 10: Happy Birthday!

· What different things do people typically do in your country to celebrate their birthday?

· What different ways do people celebrate birthdays in other countries?

2. Sharing

· Think about some of your past birthdays.

· Work in groups of three. Tell your group what you did to celebrate these birthdays.

As you listen to your partners, decide if you have ever celebrated your own birthday in similar ways.

3. Preparing

· Choose one experience of one member of your group. One of you is going to tell the rest of the class about this experience (it doesn't matter if the person who speaks is the person who had the experience or if they talk about the experience of someone else in their group).

· Spend 15 minutes, as a group, preparing what the speaker is going to say. Think about a) information, such as how old the person was (or when the birthday was, if the person's age is a sensitive issue); where the person was at the time; who the person celebrated the birthday with; what the person did to celebrate it; and how the person felt during the celebration; and b) the organisation and structure of what the speaker will say.

4. Performing

· The speaker from each group talks to the rest of the class.

· As you are listening to other speakers, try to answer the following questions.

a) When and where did the birthday celebration take place?

b) Who did the person celebrate their birthday with?

c) What did the birthday celebration consist of?

d) How did the person feel during the birthday celebration?

e) To what extent would you like to celebrate your own birthday in a similar way?

5. Reporting

· When you have heard the speaker from each group, check your answers to the questions with the other members of your group.

· As a group, decide which of the people you have heard about, in your opinion, enjoyed their birthday celebration the most.

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Welcome to the website of the Speaking Cyclist, an English Language Teacher who believes the best teaching material is the students themselves! A speaking cycle is a simple template for highly-personalised speaking practice with students at any level. New cycles, all following the same template and useable immediately with minimal preparation, will be posted regularly. In the meantime, 'Speaking Cycles - A Brief Introduction' and 'Speaking Cycles - Behind The Scenes' provide further details.

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About Me

I am a ELT teacher, author and teacher trainer. Since March 2003 I have been Director of Studies at WELS Bath (formerly International House Bath).
The notion of ‘speaking cycles’ was the basis of a presentation I gave with Ceri Jones, a former colleague and fellow ELT author, at the 2000 TESOL Spain Conference in Madrid. I have recently been inspired to revisit them for two reasons. Firstly, the DOGME ELT movement led by Scott Thornbury & Luke Meddings has encouraged me to question the extent to which students are truly engaged by most commercial ELT teaching material. Secondly, as a DoS I often need to teach at short notice, with no time to put together lesson plans or to source material. In this respect, speaking cycles are the perfect solution. I hope other time-stretched teachers (and Directors of Studies!) find them useful too.